Disappearing Western Nations
What makes a nation and a culture? The people with the unstated social conventions and beliefs, or the language?
This is important to know because in many parts of the world the people are being replaced by new immigrant groups.
This happened in the ancient past also. For example, the Indo-Europeans are an intrusive group in Europe, or in the colonial period the original populations of the Americas were replaced by European colonizers.
The process of replacement is different now.
In many parts of the world, the population has started to fall and since the fall is not uniform in all regions, this is triggering massive migration across nations and geographical regions. For example, many millions have crossed over into the United States and Europe in the past few years. According to the projections of the US Census, it will become a white minority country in 2045. By 2060, only 36.4% of its under-18 population will be white.
In many regions, the existing population will be eventually dwarfed by the migrants, leading to political and social stresses, but slowly people will get adjusted to the new demographic reality.
For example, Britain after the Second World War was nearly 100% white and now that is so for only 82% of the population (white British people are actually only 74% with the rest immigrants from East Europe). In the City of London, currently 46% of its residents are Black and Minority Ethnic.
According to the Migration Observatory at the University of Oxford, the UK’s minority groups will increase to 40% by 2050 (they were only 10% in 2006).
The whites will become a minority by 2070. Will Britain still be the same culture, say in 2100, when the whites are only one-third of the population?
Why is the population of the UK without net migration falling? This is because the number of babies being born in Europe fell below the replacement rate nearly fifty years ago.
At the end of the century, the accompanying chart shows, nearly half of the babies in the world will be born in Africa and just over one-third in Asia. The population of the other continents will decline sharply from the current levels, and the migrating people will be mostly Africans and Asians.
The population of Japan, where there is minimal immigration, is expected to plunge from its current 124 million to 104 million by 2050, and according to one estimate it will be down to 63 million in 2100. But Japan has chosen not to permit too many immigrants in, so perhaps its culture will be essentially the same as now.
Canada’s Disappearing Act
If we consider a decline similar to Japan’s, the population of Canada without immigration is expected to be around 20 million by 2100.
According to Statistics Canada, the Canadian population would reach 47.7 million in 2041, and 25.0 million of them would be immigrants or children of immigrants born in Canada, accounting for 52.4% of the total population.
Politicians in Canada are worried that this fall in the population will decrease the importance of the country in world affairs.
So, what is Canada trying to do?
Its Century Initiative seeks to grow the country’s population from the current 41 million to 100 million by the end of the century. It says:
The world is changing at a rapid pace, and Canada is falling behind. Our population is aging, we’re having fewer children, and our workforce is shrinking. If we stay the course, Canada’s annual GDP growth will decline, along with our influence on the world stage.
Growing our population to 100 million by 2100 would reduce the burden on government revenues to fund health care, old age security, and other services. It would also mean more skilled workers, innovation, and dynamism in the Canadian economy. 100 million by 2100 is not just a number. It’s a vision for the Canada we want to build for future generations.
The Century Initiative was co-founded by Mark Wiseman and Dominic Barton, and is supported by many influential Liberal and Conservative party leaders.
Supposing this initiative succeeds, what would it mean?
Of the 100 million population, 20 million will be descendants of the residents of Canada mid-century, half of whom are expected to be of European stock and the other half from assorted countries.
The rest of the 80 million will be immigrants from Asia and Africa or their descendants. and not from Europe because its own population is shrinking.
In this scenario, Canada in 2100 will be 90% non-European and 10% European.
Some people think that Canada’s society will be able to assimilate the immigrants into the host culture, but all historical precedents tell us that will not happen.
Look at the Roma in Europe who have not assimilated into European culture after over a thousand years, and many immigrant groups have not assimilated into Europe’s culture even after fifty years. This history has grave implications for the culture of Canada for it is unlikely that it will be similar to that of the present.
There is irony in this turn of events. The European population of Canada in 1761 was just under 76,000 people. Seventy years later, in 1831, Canada’s population had just surpassed the 1 million mark. The indigenous population of Canada had been replaced by the European population.
Now we are in the midst of a second replacement in which by the end of the century, the population will be overwhelmingly non-European.
References
The Coming population collapse
Canada’s Century Initiative
